Border wall58 former national security officials challenge national emergency declaration

Published 25 February 2019

A group of 58 former senior U.S. national security officials will today (Monday) release a statement criticizing President Donald Trump’s for using, without factual justification, a national emergency declaration to fund a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. “Under no plausible assessment of the evidence is there a national emergency today that entitles the president to tap into funds appropriated for other purposes to build a wall at the southern border,” the group of former senior officials said.

A group of 58 former senior U.S. national security officials will today (Monday) release a statement criticizing President Donald Trump’s for using, without factual justification, a national emergency declaration to fund a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Trump made the declaration ten days ago. Figures compiled by the Department of Homeland Security contradict and undercut practically all of the assertions Trump made in trying to justify taking funds from other federal accounts and using them to build the wall.

Trump made the national emergency declaration after the majority of Republicans and Democrats in Congress agreed to fund other measures to bolster border security, measures recommended by security officials.

“Under no plausible assessment of the evidence is there a national emergency today that entitles the president to tap into funds appropriated for other purposes to build a wall at the southern border,” the group of former senior officials said.

The former security officials’ 13-page statement, a copy of which was shared with the Washington Post, offers details of their argument that there is no factual basis for the president’s emergency.

DHS’s own numbers show that illegal border crossings are at nearly 40-year lows. Undetected unlawful entries at the U.S.-Mexico border decreased from 851,000 to nearly 62,000 between 2006 and 2016.

The former national security officials note that contrary to the president’s false assertions, there is no documented emergency at the southern border related to terrorism or violent crime. This is the consensus conclusion of all U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies, DHS, and independent think tank analyses.

Trump also claimed that the additional 234 miles of wall he wants – there are already different types of physical barriers along 620 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border – are necessary to fight the importation of opioids. The Department of Justice, however, said that “the overwhelming majority of opioids” that enter the United States are brought in through legal ports of entry. A wall would be irrelevant for stopping opioids importation – but better scanning equipment and better trained personnel at legal ports of entry would be relevant, and much less expensive.

“The President’s actions are at odds with the overwhelming evidence in the public record, including the administration’s own data and estimates,” the former officials said.

“We have lived and worked through national emergencies, and we support the President’s power to mobilize the Executive Branch to respond quickly in genuine national emergencies. But under no plausible assessment of the evidence is there a national emergency today that entitles the President to tap into funds appropriated for other purposes to build a wall at the southern border.”

Among the statement’s prominent signatories are former Secretaries of State Madeleine Albright and John Kerry, former Defense Secretaries Chuck Hagel and Leon Panetta, and former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.

Also on the list are former CIA Director John Brennan, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former National Security Adviser Thomas Donilon, former Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection Gil Kerlikowske, former NATO Ambassador R. Nicholas Burns, longtime U.S. ambassador Ryan Crocker, and former Ambassadors to the United Nations Thomas Pickering, Samantha Power and Susan Rice.

Trump declared a national emergency at the southern border after signing a bipartisan government-funding bill which allocated $1.375 billion for border security.

Politico notes that Trump, in an effort to fulfill a campaign promise, insisted on having $5.7 billion for a wall.

The emergency declaration, if it withstands congressional opposition and court challenges, will allow the White House to redirect $3.6 billion earmarked for military construction to Trump’s wall project. The administration is also seeking to use $2.5 billion from a Pentagon drug prevention program and $600 million from a Treasury Department drug forfeiture fund to construct or repair up to 234 miles of border barrier.

Former presidents have invoked emergency powers 59 times since the National Emergencies Act was enacted in 1976, but historians and legal analysts say that no past president has employed the 1976 for political reasons and to secure taxpayer dollars that had been denied by Congress.